


perfect strangers

by vagarius



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Neighbors, Friendship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Neglect, Light Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-21
Updated: 2020-07-21
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:01:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25415086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vagarius/pseuds/vagarius
Summary: a story of two boys, an absent neighbor, and three dogs
Relationships: Bokuto Koutarou & Kageyama Tobio
Comments: 16
Kudos: 89





	perfect strangers

**Author's Note:**

> i actually wrote this back in 2017 but never published it in hopes of writing a second chapter. i've forgotten what was supposed to be _in_ that second chapter, but with the hq manga ending, i figured it was time to publish the first chapter as a one shot.
> 
> haikyuu has given me many things, and one of these things was the ability to explore these strange sorts of stories. back in 2017, writing this fic had done something good for me. i might not be able to remember what, but i know it did.
> 
> i still have more hq wips to finish (and perhaps, even more to start) - for now, please enjoy!!

When Tobio was small, and his house larger than need be, he had a neighbor who locked themself inside on rainy days, then disappeared for weeks at a time. He never thought much of it, simply watching his neighbor's car as it rolled down the driveway, damp with old puddles, and drove away. They always returned, eventually, even if it was around midnight on a Sunday and woke Tobio up, and made him tired for school on Monday.

He assumed his neighbor lived alone. They probably liked their space, and that was fine, because Tobio was supposed to respect people's personal preferences, even if they seemed weird to him. (And they did seem weird to him: wouldn't anyone get lonely in a two-bedroom home?)

It was during one of his neighbor's disappearances that he heard the barking.

He thought it was the wind, at first – the wind does strange things – but after a while, it couldn't be mistaken. There were dogs, and they were barking, muddled as it was. And Tobio, in all his logic and childish innocence, decided to find them.

And now he was outside his neighbor's garage in the rain, pulling the door up far enough for him to slip inside. The inside of the garage was dark, but there was a small sliver of light from under the door, and that was good enough.

The three dogs he finds inside gradually stop barking, instead staring at Tobio like he's actually something interesting. It's a nice feeling. And the dogs are soft when he pets them, and warm when he lies down, even if the floor is cold and uncomfortable.

He ignores the golden eyes that stare at him from under the door. He's probably imagining them.

This is how Tobio spends his nights, waiting for his neighbor to return and ruin them.

It's selfish, but he hopes they never do.

Golden eyes still stare at him from under the door, but Tobio gets used to them. Comes to expect them, even, to find them comforting. Despite their intimidating hue, the eyes have never been cold or calculating - only curious.

"You know," Tobio tells them, one night, "you can come inside, too. The dogs won't mind."

He doesn't expect a response, much less a person, but a person is what he gets. For a moment, he's afraid they are going to send him or the dogs away, and ends up holding the dogs protectively in his arms, as best as he can.

"Just wondering why you never turn the light on," the person says, and walks right past Tobio to turn on the light.

Tobio has to squint, for a moment, before he can get a good look at the person. He's a boy around his age, with the same delicate frame that Tobio has, with his eyes a bit too wide for his face. Tobio wonders why he's never seen him before.

"Who are you?" the boy asks, tilting his head. It reminds Tobio of a bird.

"Tobio," he answers. "And you?"

"Koutarou."

Tobio blinks and brings the dogs closer. "Nice to meet you, Koutarou."

"Who told you to say a greeting like that?" Koutarou comments, and Tobio should feel insulted, probably, but Koutarou says it so genuinely that it's hard to feel anything of the sort. "It's so formal."

"You're supposed to be polite to strangers." His parents don't really talk to him, but they told him at least that much.

Koutarou furrows his eyebrows and tilts his head farther. "We're not strangers, though?"

Tobio absentmindedly pets one of the dogs. "Until now, we were perfect strangers." Another term his parents use. _Perfect strangers._

"Doesn't mean you have to be so stuffy about it." Koutarou flaps his hand as he says this, as if brushing away the formality. "Especially since we're friends now, right?"

"Friends?" Tobio blurts, unintentionally. The sound is too loud in the quiet space.

Like Tobio's admission was a signal, Koutarou's volume also increases. "Yeah!" he replies, "The dogs seem to like you, so we're friends!"

Tobio hovers a protective hand once more. "What do the dogs have to do with it?"

"Well, they're my dogs, so if they trust you, then you must be trustworthy. And your friends are the people you trust." Koutarou explains it like it's easy, and maybe it is.

Tobio kind of feels bad, though, almost like he's been stealing Koutarou's companions, but Koutarou doesn't seem to mind. "You don't," Tobio starts, just to make sure, "mind me, uh – "

"Sleeping with my dogs?" Koutarou finishes, and it's kind of embarrassing, when he puts it that way. "Not at all! I mean, it's kind of weird, but you seem happy, and the dogs seem happy, so I'm happy."

"I like the way you explain things," Tobio tells him, "Most people don't make sense at all, and expect me to understand."

Koutarou smiles, bright and wide, just like his eyes. "I know, right? That's why I try to make things simple."

Tobio usually has trouble making smiles, but this one slips on easily, even if it's a bit awkward, a bit crooked. Belatedly, he says, "Did you want to sleep here?"

Koutarou flaps his hand again, the same way as before. "Nah, I have a bed inside. You can come inside too, if you want."

"No thanks. I think I'll stay with the dogs." Tobio would ask if he could bring the dogs inside, but he has a feeling there's a rule ingrained somewhere in Koutarou's mind, that while neither of them can make any sense of it, neither of them are willing to question it, either. Especially not Koutarou.

"Are you sure? It's pretty cold."

"I'm used to it," Tobio answers. Tobio, although he isn't sure why, figures Koutarou is used to it too. "The dogs are warm."

Koutarou smiles again, and nods, trotting back under the garage door and supposedly to another door that leads inside.

And Tobio wonders why, for once, he didn't feel obligated to leave. Maybe it was the dogs.

(Maybe it was Koutarou.)

When Kageyama's family moves away, volleyball saves him.

(He wonders if volleyball could've saved Koutarou, too.)

His old neighbor never did return, but left traces in their wake, like the scarred skin on Koutarou's shoulder and the skinniness of Koutarou's wrists. The dogs were never touched; the dogs were Koutarou's, and Koutarou took care of his things. Not that he ever thought of the dogs as _things._

They were his friends, and now that Kageyama thinks about it, probably his lifeline.

The dogs had lived in the garage, but it never seemed like it. Koutarou kept them well-fed and tremendously loved, and snuck them outside early in the morning for daily runs. After Kageyama showed up, he had started waiting for Kageyama to leave before taking them out. Kageyama remembered feeling guilty, but Koutarou thought nothing of it, and invited Kageyama to run with him in the mornings.

Kageyama reminisces, sometimes, now that he's about to enter high school and goes on his own morning runs. He remembers how proud Koutarou looked when he found a threadbare blanket and washed it clean in the tub, and laid it down on the garage floor like a prize; remembers Koutarou explaining how his neighbor – Koutarou's guardian, Kageyama assumed, though it was never specified – left money on the counter or in the drawers that Koutarou could use for food, whether it be for himself or the dogs.

And how he loved those dogs.

Kageyama breathes heavily, slowing down to a walk as he approaches his house. He has a half-hour or so to cool down and shower, if he wants to beat Hinata to morning practice, and an extra ten minutes or so if he simply wants to make it on time. He can work with that.

Thirty minutes later, he checks all the lights, replaces the bucket under the leaky faucet, and rushes out the door, locking it behind him. He almost forgets his overnight bag, but remembers to grab it at the last second. The team was leaving for another joint training camp, that afternoon, and Kageyama wasn't going to delay the bus because he forgot his bag. Unlike most of his teammates, there would be no one home to drop it off at the school.

(That in itself isn't all that weird, especially for a high school student. But once in grade school, he had cried because he forgot his lunch, and didn't have money to buy any. When his teacher asked if his parents could bring his lunch to the school – _you live close by, don't you? –_ he had shaken his head forlornly, not because he didn't live close by, but because his parents were never home. It was fine, really – a little sad, and a little lonely, but it was normal and it was _fine_ – but his teacher looked at him like the admission pained her, and Kageyama couldn't figure out why.

His parents may have been perfect strangers, but that was normal, and that was fine.

He never did forget his lunch again.)

Kageyama speeds up as he approaches the gym, Hinata at his heels, and will deny nearly collapsing in front of the clubroom door until his dying days. "Another win for me," he pants, clutching at the wall.

"No way!" Hinata exclaims, gasping for breath. "The winner, was totally, _me._ " He grins challengingly, but with no real heat behind it. There hasn't been anything harsher than friendly competition, lately, and Kageyama revels in it.

The captain shows up a few minutes later to actually _unlock_ the clubroom, and Kageyama puts down his bags with a sigh. How Hinata rides over the mountain with this much stuff, Kageyama will never know, and will never ask.

Practice runs smoothly, but Kageyama loses focus more times than he'd like, his mind drifting back to his old house, and his old neighbor's garage, and golden eyes that –

_Focus, Tobio. This has nothing to do with volleyball._

_This has nothing to do with volleyball._

Except it has everything to do with volleyball, he discovers later. Because when Kageyama's family moved away, volleyball saved him.

And volleyball saved Koutarou, too.

**Author's Note:**

> a remnant, of a lost second chapter:
> 
> It's hard to reconcile Bokuto – strong, top-tier spiker Bokuto – with the Koutarou of his memories, fragile yet just as bright.  
> But there is no mistaking his eyes.
> 
> They're the same golden eyes that stared at him from under the door, that were too wide for his face, that were nothing but curious, despite their intimidating hue.
> 
> The similarities, in all honesty, end there.
> 
> (At least, that's what Kageyama tells himself. It's obvious, in the way they interact, that Bokuto's friends are still his lifeline, and that it cuts like a double-edged sword. And he wears his jersey like a threadbare blanket he washed in the tub and laid on the cold garage floor.  
> Like a prize.)
> 
> For a while, he doesn't think Bokuto recognizes him, doesn't think Bokuto remembers the little boy Tobio who slept with his dogs on the floor.
> 
> _I suppose,_ Kageyama thinks, _that I'm hard to reconcile, too._


End file.
